The Daily Tar HeelThursday, September 14, 19893
Grady attiop rates may become public
By STACI COX
Assistant Managing Editor
A bill that would require colleges
and universities to release the gradu
ation rates of scholarship athletes has
been introduced to the U.S. Senate, and
a study of those graduation rates show
they are worse than originally thought.
"The study showed that 35 basket
ball programs in this country have
graduation rates below 20 percent, and
that's not good enough," said Tommy
Brennan, a spokesman for Sen. Edward
Kennedy's education staff.
Kennedy, D-Mass., is sponsoring the
Student-Athlete Right to Know Act
with Bill Bradley, D-N.J., a former
basketball player with the University
of Cincinnati and the New York Knicks.
If passed, the bill would require all
colleges and universities that receive
federal funding to give the graduation
rates of all scholarship athletes to the
NCAA, which would report the find
ings to the U.S. secretary of education.
Schools that fail to comply would lose
federal funds.
"I think it's a positive move," said
John Blanchard, UNC athletic associ
ate academic counselor. "It's impor
tant to high school students interested
in participating in college athletics to
know what the track records for gradu
ation are."
The bill was introduced in May, but
concerns were raised that collection
and tabulation of the data would cost
universities too much time and money.
Cairboiro
By JESSICA LANNING
Assistant City Editor
The Carrboro Board of Aldermen
voted this week to delete major por
tions of the town's Comprehensive
Downtown Traffic Circulation Plan
following a wave of resident opposi
tion. At a public hearing Tuesday, resi
dents and business owners expressed
disapproval of the Carrboro Transpor
tation Advisory Board's (TAB) pro
posal to ease Carrboro's traffic woes.
The plan has been a source of heated
debate for two years.
The Board of Aldermen held the
hearing to listen to concerns of Carrboro
residents about TAB's recommenda
tions to widen and extend roads in an
effort to alleviate the traffic congestion
in downtown Carrboro,
ifniown vaiTDOro.
lowing the residents' presenta-
Following the residents' presenta
N.C. SAT scores slip to
state's teachers express
f CHUCK WILLIAMS
ft Writer
By CHUCK WILLIAMS
Staff Writer
North Carolina high school students
dropped to last in the nation in average
Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) scores,
prompting concern and alarm among
state educators.
North Carolina's scores dropped five
points to 836 this year, ranking the state
50th in the nation. The SAT is graded
on a score range of 400 to 1 ,600 points.
The state had been making small
gains every year for the last five years.
North Carolina replaced South Caro
lina at the bottom of the rankings. South
Carolina has focused more heavily on
, student performance, which has been
linked to the rise in rank.
State education officials have ex
pressed concern about the last-place
ranking. Bob Etheridge, state superin
tendent of public instruction, released a
report Tuesday outlining a plan de
signed to improve the state's scores.
The College Board said a state-by-state
ranking did not indicate a state's
educational ranking because different
percentages of students take the test in
different states. But North Carolina still
ranked behind many states such as
Virginia, Indiana and South Carolina,
which had almost identical percent
ages of students taking the test.
The SAT scores of UNC-Chapel Hill
undergraduates have not necessarily
reflected the statewide drop.
"I think one of the things you must
understand is that the number of appli
cations have gone up so we are seeing
better and better SAT scores each year,"
said Herb Davis, associate director of
admissions at UNC.
"The UNC General Administration
has set forth in 1990 to have a specific
set of courses to be admissible."
Getting students to take more chal
Kennedy requested that the General
Accounting Office (GAO), an investi
gative branch of Congress, conduct a
survey to determine the economic plau
sibility of the bill and determine the
graduation rates of basketball and foot
ball teams at Division A schools.
"It turned out collection of data was
not much of an issue ... more than half
of the schools already do it, even though
most of them choose not to make the
results public," said Ned Griffith, a
public affairs specialist at the GAO.
While the results of the first half of
the study were positive, the athlete
graduation rates were poor. The report
compared the basketball graduation
rate of 97 men's basketball and 103
football programs to that of the entire
student body for each school over a
five-year period.
Men's basketball programs had the
worst showing, with 30 of the 97 schools
having a graduation rate of 5 percent or
less. Football teams graduate a higher
percentage of players overall, but the
majority of football programs graduate
less than 40 percent of their scholarship
players.
"You must remember that football
teams are much larger, and one failure
is a great deal more compromising to
basketball teams," said Jay Eglin, as
sistant director for higher education
issues at the GAO. "And graduation
rates by themselves are not the only
aldermen
tion, the board voted to delete many of
the major portions of the TAB plan.
Those deletions include any changes
on Merritt Mill Road, the creation of
one-way streets downtown and any
extentions to Lloyd, Carr and Parker
streets and Brewer Lane.
Residents primary complaints with
TAB's $7.5 million wish list were the
widening of Merritt Mill Road to the
south of Franklin Street and the closing
of that road to the north side; the one
way loop created with Main and Weaver
streets; and the extension of Lloyd Street
in north Carrboro.
Steve Oglesbee, a spokesman for
TAB, said the group worked toward
four goals:
to provide efficient circulation of
traffic to attract patrons to downtown;
iu increase pariung anu luaumg
zones;
to increase parking and loading
lenging high school courses is also a
pood idea. Davis said.
good idea, Davis said.
State education officials agree there
is a need to take another look at North
Carolina's schools.
"Bob Etheridge has said the scores
do give us reason to be concerned,"
said Kay Williams, consultant for media
relations at the State Department of
Public Instruction. "We need to look
and see what can be changed in the
secondary schools."
In his report, Etheridge said, "We
trailed every state in the nation except
South Carolina and the District of
Columbia last year in average SAT
scores. This year we are on the absolute
bottom ... You reach a point when the
only way to go is up, and North Caro
lina intends to do whatever is necessary
to go up."
Etheridge released a five-point plan
to improve the state's scores. He pro
posed the following:
establishing a Task Force on Excel
lency in Secondary Education;
having more accountability among
schools by comparing their SAT scores;
using the PSAT and other SAT
coaching methods to better prepare
students for the test;
intensifying efforts to encourage
students to take more rigorous high
school courses; and
using the recently passed Senate
Bill 2 to allow local school systems to
Looli for the cnpandcd Edito
rial and Sports pages euery
Monday in
The Daily Tar Heel!!!
Hwy. 54 at 1-40, Chapel HillDurham, 493-8096 967-8227
Atlantic Ave. at Spring Forest Rd., Raleigh 790-1 200
Lunch:
1 1 :30-2:00 Sunday-Friday
Dinner:
5:00-9:00 Sunday-Thursday
5:00-1 0:00 Friday & Saturday
Graduation Rates 1982-87
97 NCAA Division 1 schools contacted
50-1
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important thing. When you take into
account that a number of schools only
graduate 20 percent of the entire stu
dent body, a lot of the team percentages
don't look as bad."
The GAO figures further reinforced
sponsor commitment for the bill, Bren
nan said.
vote to revise downtown traffic plan
to provide safe and attractive paths
for pedestrians and bicyclists; and
to allow a more efficient route
through downtown for those unable to
use the U.S. 15-501 bypass south of
town or Interstate 40 north of town.
To reach these goals the board de
cided to improve existing roads, add
another corridor running north and south
by extending Lloyd Street and elimi
nate some of the signal phases so the
traffic would move easier through town,
Oglesbee said. "It is very important to
us to alleviate the traffic problem by
dispersing it."
The Rev. Carrington Carter from St.
Paul's AME Church said he opposed
the widening of Merritt Mill Road and
the closing of road on the north side of
Franklin Street.
viusmg mciiui mm ivuau wuu
interfere with the activities of the chur
Closing Merritt Mill Road would
interfere with the activities of the church
last place;
concern
improve student achievement.
The. fifth noint rf th. nlan is
The fifth point of the plan is similar
to South Carolina's approach in im
proving schools and will give local
districts more freedom in how they use
state resources.
Officials have stressed that results of
the program will not be seen immedi
ately. "Mr. Etheridge has said he won't be
able to make any kind of projections
until next year as to when we can ex
. pect improvement," Williams said.
N.C. students score well on stan
dardized tests compared to other states
until about the eighth grade, so the
focus in school improvement will be on
the high school level.
High school officials see course
schedules and reading habits as a factor
in the low scores.
"I think part of it is students not
reading," said Linda Mahan, a guid
ance counselor at Needham Broughton
High School in Raleigh.
The PSAT, a test similar to the SAT
given the sophomore year in high
school, has also been shown to enhance
SAT performance.
"Wake County started last year re
quiring all sophomores to take the
PSAT, which we provide funds for,"
Mahan said.
Wake County SAT scores rose this
year, Mahan said.
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For big, bigger
and biggest appetites.
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11 yy,
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41-60 61-80 81-100
of graduates
Basketball players
"The NCAA has not acted to rectify
any of this, so this bill is trying to let
potential athletes know what their pros
pects of graduation are and what the
priorities of the university in question
are," he said.
The Senate will probably vote on the
bill sometime next month.
because the new intersection would
limit access to the church, . he said.
"It's not broke and we don't think it
needs fixin' ," he said as about 40 people
applauded.
Edwin Caldwell, a resident who also
spoke on behalf of the church, said
there were many elderly people who
have lived on the southern part of Merritt
Mill Road who would have difficulty
relocating if the widening of that road
affected their homes. "I don't want us
to get so sophisticated that we solve our
problems without thinking about
people."
Lyle Lansdell, of 301 E. Poplar Ave.,
said she felt the one-way loop created
by Main and Weaver streets would
cause more traffic on her road because
motorists would choose her street as a
shorter route to north Carrboro to avoid
using one-way streets and a lot of stop
lights. There are many children who play in
the neighborhood and many couples
who like to walk, ride their bicycles and
walk their pets along the road, Lansdell
V
: -
- ; JV.
City Police Roundup
In Chapel Hill:
Police said a Pittsboro man was
charged Tuesday with two counts of
safecracking and two counts of break
ing and entering and larceny.
Michael Farrar, 29, of Pittsboro
was charged with breaking and enter
ing in connection with a July 26 break
in at the Henderson Street Bar and an
Aug. 29 break in at Tijuana Fats
Restaurant. Farrar was also charged
with illegally entering the safes at
both locations.
Chapel Hill police have charged
two University students with driving
while impaired following auto acci
dents this week.
Police charged Rebecca Lynn
Wooten, 20, with driving while im
paired after she was involved in an
accident Wednesday. Wooten was
driving on West Franklin Street near
Church Street at 1:50 a.m. when her
car left the road and hit a light pole.
A person in the car was taken to
North Carolina Memorial Hospital
where she was treated for minor inju
ries and released. Damage to the car
is estimated at $6,000.
Police also charged David Suk
Bum Kang, 19, of Chapel Hill with
driving while impaired after his car
ran off Airport Road near Dixie Drive.
No injuries were reported but dam
age to the car was estimated at $6,000.
A 16-year-old Chapel Hill Senior
High School student was charged with
said. "I consider my neighborhood a
community resource."
Terry Roberts, of 400 Pleasant Dr.,
said he was never notified of the hear
ing even though his house would be
moved to make way for the expansions.
"We saw the posters, and that was
the only way we found out about this
meeting. There has been a communica
tion problem."
Many others said they were not noti
fied of the meeting. Mayor Eleanor
Kinnaird said that letters were not sent
out for expense reasons and that posters
were used instead.
Jane Hamborsky, co-owner of
Maggie's Muffins, said she did not
believe many of the people coming
through Carrboro were residents but
rather people who were "cutting
through" to get to the University.
Many people are going through the
downtowns of Carrboro and Chapel
Hill because it is quicker than using the
1 5-50 154 bypass, she said. Hamborsky
suggested a survey to determine who
was using downtown Carrboro as a
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And only 19
106 W. Franklin
3Y1
one count of larceny Wednesday in
connection with a stolen bicycle.
Police discovered the student with
a custom-made bicycle that had been
reported stolen Tuesday from the
Chancellor Square Apartments on
Church Street.
A Chapel Hill resident contacted
police Monday and reported that tick
ets of Saturday's Rolling Stone con
cert were stolen from a local resi
dence. The person told police that six tick
ets valued at $183 were taken from a
Britt Court home.
Police have not determined how
someone got into the house and they
have no suspects at this time.
Police charged a Chapel Hill man
Monday with assualt on a female in
connection with a domestic dispute.
Police reports said Joseph D. Judd,
36, was charged after he attacked and
threatened a female acquaintance.
Judd was also served an arrest order
for not appearing in Chapel Hill Dis
trict Court on previous charges.
A UNC student was charged with
theft Monday for reportedly taking
an air conditioner from a local hard
ware store.
According to police reports, Ken
neth L. Johnson of Chapel Hill was
charged after he took an air condi
tioner from the Lowes on East Fran
klin Street.
compiled by Charles Brittain
shorter route, and then decide how to
alleviate traffic problems.
Businesses are not as successful on
one-way roads, and a one-way loop
will cause may more problems, she
said. "Either businesses will fall off or
there will be problems on side streets
with the added traffic."
Joe Parrish, of 412 Lloyd St., said
extending his street to Estes Drive would
make the street into a thoroughfare and
increase the speed of the cars on that
street.
Parrish said he thanked the city for
paving the road several years ago and
said the many elderly people who live
there enjoy it.
"Some are gone and didn't get to
enjoy it. The ones that are left, they
want to enjoy it. If you build a thor
oughfare, they can't enjoy it."
Before he left the microphone, Par
rish asked the board one last time not to
extend his road.
"We do our duty when you ask us to
vote for you, so help us."
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